San Francisco startup helps Cleveland Clinic teach AI to read minds in ICUs

The Cleveland Clinic is teaming up with San Francisco startup Piramidal to give doctors a high-tech superpower: an AI system that can read patients’ brainwaves in real time.

By analyzing electroencephalogram (EEG) data as it streams in, the system can flag early warning signs of medical emergencies in seconds, rather than hours.

That means ICU teams could step in sooner, potentially preventing life-threatening events.

It’s the next step toward putting cutting-edge brain monitoring on constant, 24/7 alert.

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Trials will take place in the Cleveland Clinic

EEGs, which record the brain’s electrical activity via electrodes on the scalp, are nothing new.

What’s new is the scale and speed at which Piramidal’s AI can interpret them.

Right now, ICU EEG monitoring is continuous, but doctors don’t watch every moment unfold.

Instead, they typically get a report every 12 to 24 hours, and reviewing that data can take several hours.

This is time-consuming, subjective, and dependent on expertise.

However, Piramidal’s partnership with the Cleveland Clinic is designed to change that.

By constantly monitoring patients in the ICU, doctors will be better able to know how their brain health is evolving in real time.

It will also presumably free up more time for doctors to do other tasks, like conducting remote surgery 5,000 miles away using robotic arms.

You know, typical doctor stuff.

Piramidal has ambitions beyond the ICU

Founded in 2023, the San Francisco startup has already raised $6 million in seed funding from Y Combinator.

Their ‘brain foundation model’ draws on nearly a million hours of EEG recordings from tens of thousands of patients, in order to understand the patterns that signal neurological problems.

Think of it as ChatGPT for brainwaves: the more data it sees, the better it gets at recognizing what’s normal and what’s not, across a wide variety of brains.

The San Francisco startup is currently fine-tuning the model with historical patient data from the Cleveland Clinic.

Live trials in a controlled ICU environment are planned for the next six to eight months, with a gradual rollout after that to reduce the risk of false alarms.

While the ICU is the immediate focus, Piramidal has bigger ambitions: applying the tech to epilepsy care, sleep monitoring, and beyond.

Of course, as with any AI that touches human health, there are some big questions about things like accuracy, privacy, and ethics.

For example, just look at what happened when this American startup lets its AI assistant runs its shop.

Interestingly, this isn’t even the first time AI is being used in a medical setting.

China is currently developing the world’s first AI hospital, with robot doctors that are projected to treat 3,000 patients daily.

If all goes to plan, AI is going to be a big part of the medical industry in the future.

Perhaps it’s almost time to add ‘doctor’ to the list of jobs that are most affected by AI.

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